Sam Elliot, 32, is a Kamloops paramedic and has qualified for a national competition searching for emerging comedians across Canada.
Image Credit: SUBMITTED/Sam Elliot
March 11, 2019 - 3:30 PM
KAMLOOPS — As a paramedic in Kamloops, Sam Elliot deals with a variety of difficult calls that can be a challenge to deal with emotionally. But he has always been the type of person to crack jokes and never take life too seriously.
The budding comedian recently made CBC’s national competition NEXT UP, which is an amateur stand-up comedy contest searching for emerging talent across Canada. The list of 100 comedic hopefuls, released earlier this month, includes Elliot.
It’s something he finds hard to believe considering he only started his standup career six months ago.
“The whole thing has been crazy,” says the 32-year-old paramedic.
Elliot says he intended to submit his 90-second video clip as practice and admits he wasn’t expecting to make it in.
“It’s an insane thing to say for someone who has only been doing this for six months,” he says.
Elliot’s love for comedy goes back to his childhood.
“My whole life I have been watching stand-ups,” he says. “My brothers and sisters are all much funnier than me so it was always just a fun thing within our family.”
Elliot says one day he started writing jokes and found how much he enjoyed it.
“I had all these notebooks [full] of jokes and I thought ‘Maybe I should go tell people some jokes,’” he says.
He even remembers his first time speaking in front of an audience at the Art We Are cafe in downtown Kamloops where they occasionally have open mic nights.
“I thought, ‘I’ll just go up there and try and tell a story’ and it was horrible,” Elliot says. “I remember just thinking, ‘just keep talking’ and I was terrified the whole time.”
Elliot says despite being nervous, he had a lot of fun. He decided to go to Kelowna and work with comics at Dakodas, a sports bar and grill which offers comedy shows.
In the last six months, Elliot has been doing shows regularly and has even headlined his own show in Kamloops last month. He has also featured in a few shows in Kelowna.
“The fact that more than a few people want to hear me do comedy is crazy,” he says. “Everyone has been really nice and they all seem to like it and if they don’t, they’re all still being nice about it.”
With his job, Elliot says comedy has helped him connect with the people he meets.
“I generally don’t take things too seriously, it helps me not get sucked into bad calls,” he says. “We do a lot of mental health calls and usually I can get people laughing by the time I hit the hospital which is nice.”
Elliot says he hopes to continue making people laugh and encourages more people to check out comedy shows throughout the Thompson-Okanagan.
"There are so many amazing comedians in Kelowna and Kamloops,'' he says.
To vote for Elliot go here.
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